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Mail bomb suspect to face hearing as lawmakers call for civility

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An NYPD police officer stands guard as a suspicious package which turned out to be an explosive device was discovered in a New York Post Office and addressed to former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and CNN on 52nd Street in New York City. Photo by John Angelillo UPI

By Daniel Uria, UPI

The Florida man charged with sending 13 suspected pipe bombs to prominent Democrats is scheduled for a hearing in Florida on Monday.

Cesar Sayoc Jr., the 56-year-old currently being held at the Miami Federal Detention Center, will appear before the U.S. District Court in Miami on Monday before being prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Southern District of New York, ,The Miami Herald reported.

He faces charges of interstate transportation of an explosive, illegal mailing of explosives, threats against former presidents and certain other persons, threatening interstate communications, and assaulting federal officers.

Sayoc, a resident of of Aventura, Fla., was arrested in the parking lot of an Auto Zone store in nearby Plantation after attempting to mail packages containing pipe bombs to former Democratic presidents, current Senators and billionaire donors.

On Sunday, President Donald Trump criticized billionaire Tom Steyer, one of the people targeted by the mail bombs, for an appearance on CNN's State of the Union in which Steyer said Trump and the Republican party had created an atmosphere of "political violence" in the wake of the packages and the death of 11 people in a shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pa., on Saturday.

"Just watched Wacky Tom Steyer, who I have not seen in action before, be interviewed by Jake Tapper," Trump wrote on Twitter. "He comes off as a crazed and stumbling lunatic who should be running out of money pretty soon. As bad as their field is, if he is running for President, the Dems will eat him alive!"

Trump had earlier called for unity and an "end to the politics of personal destruction" while accusing the media of using the "sinister action of one individual to score political points against me and the Republican Party" at a rally in Charlotte, N.C., on Friday.

Head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Rep. Ben Ray Luján, D-N.M., and head of the National Republican Congressional Committee Steve Stivers, R-Ohio, appeared on Fox News Sunday where they agreed the recent acts of violence shouldn't be politicized.

"We should come together as a country," Lujan said. "This should not be a political response, but rather a response at how we can further bring us together."

Stivers noted the shooting targeting a group of GOP lawmakers during baseball practice in 2017, while also calling for a sense of togetherness.

"I want to say that Ben is not my enemy. Democrats are not my enemy. They are my opponents. And while we have different visions for the future of America, different directions for America, we are all Americans first," he said. "We need to come together and do what's in the best interest of America. And no matter who wins in ten days, I believe we can come together and make that happen."

The pair of Senators also appeared on NBC's Meet the Press, where they delivered the same message while also placing some blame for the current climate on the opposing party.

"I think we all bear some responsibility and we need to try to clean up our act and try bring civility to our congress and frankly to our dialogue," Stivers said.

Lujan called on Congress to combat the climate by stopping "finger pointing."

"It's not too much to expect leaders to bring us together, to unite our country, to find a way to reach out to us to our greater good and make sure that we rise above all of the accusations and the hate and the finger pointing," he said.